Hanus Highlights Strong Vikes Showing at Day Two of Conference Championships

*Original story from govikesgo.com

VICTORIA – Danielle Hanus etched her name in the Canada West record books with an outstanding time of 59:09 in the 100-metre butterfly to capture both the gold medal and the conference record on day two of the Canada West Swimming Championships being hosted at the Saanich Commonwealth Pool.

"Danielle is talented, a very good underwater kicker, very confident at this meet and ready to race anyone that comes by," said Vikes assistant coach Ryan Clouston.

The gold medal was the third of the meet for the second-year Vike after she picked up a silver and a bronze just one night ago.

"We've done a lot of training over the past few months to get into the rhythm of the program and get back into it after a couple weeks off," said Hanus. "We didn't really taper off for this meet so it's great to see what I can do un-rested. I was just having fun doing what I can do."

10 conference records were broken on the day and Hanus makes it two Vikes that have set a Canada West record at the meet, along with Eric Hedlin's record-breaking performance in the 1500-metre freestyle yesterday.

"I wasn't really thinking too much about how the race plan was going, I just wanted to swim fast and have some fun with it," said Hanus.

Josh Zakala, also in his second year with the Vikes, made it two medals in two days when he won silver in the 400-metre Individual Medley in a time of 4:14.93.

"Quite a strong race from Josh, he's not as well-rested as some of the other guys but again he is very talented, a hard-working guy," said Clouston.

Zakala moved his way past multiple swimmers in the final stages of the race to make it six Vikes medals through two days of the competition.

Multiple Vikes just missed planting their feet on the podium throughout the day as the team finished with six other top-six results.

"I thought the day went pretty well, we had a decent prelims and put ourselves into an okay position for the night," said Clouston. "Then everyone stepped up tonight and made it a very good final session."

After two days of competition the Vikes men find themselves solidly in third-place in the team standings with 315 points, 55 better than the Alberta Golden Bears in fourth. The Vikes women meanwhile are in fifth-place, but sit just 11 points behind the Lethbridge Pronghorns for fourth.

The action in the pool wraps up tomorrow with heats starting at 9:00 a.m. and the last round of finals at 3:00 p.m. The final day of the Canada West Championship will be webcast live via pay-per-view at Canadawest.TV.

RESULTS

WOMEN 
400-metre IM: 9th – Victoria Mock (5:05.52)
100-metre butterfly: 1st (GOLD) – Danielle Hanus (59.09)
100-metre breaststroke: 9th – Kara Wilson (1:12:18)
200-metre freestyle: 12th – Kaitlin Gervais (2:05.94), 13th – Taylor Snowden-Richardson (2:08.09), 16th – Anna Letkeman (2:09.88), 17th – Tabitha Craig (2:11.20)
400-metre freestyle relay: 5th – Danielle Hanus, Kaitlin Gervais, Tabitha Craig, Kara Wilson (3:53.47)

MEN
400-metre IM: 2nd (SILVER) ­– Josh Zakala (4:14.93), 9th – Eric Hedlin (4:23.54), 11th – Zachary Dumas (4:26.45), 17th – Thomas Van Maren (4:38.85), 19th – Christopher Deegan (4:43.83)
100-metre butterfly: 5th – Ethan Jensen (55.59), 10th – Daniel Greer (55.99), 18th – Justin Schramm(58.11), 24th – Bryce Molder (59.67)
200-metre backstroke: 4th – Josh Zakala (1:57.83) 7th – Buzz Mallender (2:02.11), 11th – Ethan Phillips (2:01.80)
100-metre breaststroke: 6th – Bailey Espersen (1:03.02), 8th – Daniel Greer (1:04.02), 16th – Baylee Munro (1:07.83), 20th – Arthur Firmino (1:08.43), 22nd – Bryce Molder (1:10.74)
200-metre freestyle: 5th – Eric Hedlin (1:50.56), 9th – Justin Schramm (1:52.18), 12th – Jon McKay(1:53.72), 17th – Justin Howe (1:55.81), 24th – Christopher Deegan (1:59.24)
400-metre freestyle relay: 5th – Buzz Mallender, Josh Zakala, Daniel Greer, Eric Hedlin (3:26.36)

TEAM STANDINGS – After Day 2

WOMEN
UBC, 676
Calgary, 331
Regina, 236,5
Lethbridge, 196
Victoria, 185
Alberta, 169,5
Manitoba, 151
Thompson Rivers, 55

MEN
UBC, 549
Calgary, 435
Victoria, 315
Alberta, 260
Regina, 187
Lethbridge, 127
Manitoba, 69
Thompson Rivers, 1

Canada West Records Broken – DAY 2
Yuri Kisil, UBC, Men's 50 Freestyle (21.78)
Tristan Cote, CGY, Men's 400 Individual Medley (4:12.22)
Danielle Hanus, VIC, Women's 100 Butterfly (59.09)
Ingrid Wilm, UBC, Women's 200 Backstroke (2:06.98)
Robert Hill, CGY, Men's 200 Backstroke (1:55.83)
Kelsey Wog, MAN, Women's 100 Breaststroke (1:05.59)
Erica Seltenreich-Hodgson, UBC, Women's 200 Freestyle (1:57.23)
Markus Thormeyer, UBC, Men's 200 Freestyle (1:45.29)
UBC Women's 4x100m Relay (Ingrid Wilm, Quincy Brozo, Meredith Levorson, Erika Seltenreich-Hodgson) 3:41.46
UBC Men's 4x100m Relay (Markus Thormeyer, Luke Peddie, Jonathan Brown, Yuri Kisil) 3:17.98